Quotes About Adolescence

My Brilliant Career was beautifully directed, but I had a bit of trouble with myself in it. It was a silly script, based on a book this 16-year-old girl wrote.

I was one of those dark, quiet kids that wrote poetry.

When I was growing up, there actually wasn't a lot of YA literature as it exists today. Most of the YA that I read was from the '60s and '70s, older than me.

As someone who writes and teaches YA fiction, I spend a lot of time trying to define its character and readership, and I don't think I'm alone - genres are all about boundary drawing, and the YA genre is, in a lot of ways, about carving out boundaries around adolescence, a space for teenagers to do teenage things.

Teen fiction should be about teenagers - no matter how many arguments there are about what YA lit should be, this seems like the one thing we can all agree on.

When I was young, there was no such thing as YA. You simply went from reading children's novels to reading adult novels. So one year, I was reading Tove Jansson, and the next year, I was reading Stephen King.

Initially, I wanted to write middle grade. YA scared me: there's a lot of responsibility in being a YA author. It's so important to give that age range the right books that reflect their world and show them themselves.

When I was in the YA age range myself, I didn't feel like there were a lot of books for me.

YA, I feel, is so accurate to what it is like be a teenager and the realities of being a teenager and being in love.

I think in YA there's sometimes a temptation to create heroines who are infinitely resilient and wise and confident because those are the behaviors we want to see teens embrace and maybe we want to see those things in ourselves.

I was in Puerto Rico going to school, and it was very jarring for me. 'Traumatic' is the only way that I can say it. Kids were making fun of me: 'Oh, you're a Yankee.' And I acted out a lot. A lot. But looking back, and through a little bit of therapy, everything I am has to do with that time.

I lost my mind at 15. I'd been shown a world where there were no boundaries, where everyone gave me all the power. And I was like, 'This is great!' Then that was gone. But I was like, 'Yeah, but I still want that.' I'd lost my humble, very quiet, introverted sensibilities which I think I definitely had as a kid.

Yeah, I read Judy Blume. My mother didn't like that, but I read it anyhow.

I say to my mother all the time, 'You're the child.' And she says, 'Yeah, you're the mother.' I've been that way with her since I was 11.

I remember I took a music course in junior year of high school, and some girl brought in 'Teardrops On My Guitar,' and she was like, 'Isn't this song great?' And everyone was like, 'Who's Taylor Swift?' And now, every time I listen to Taylor Swift, I remember that moment.

I know this sounds strange, but as a kid, I was really shy. Painfully shy. The turning point was freshman year, when I was the biggest geek alive. No one, I mean no one, even talked to me.

Right before I auditioned for 'American Idol' my mom made me kinda cut my hair off, but year, I was wearing makeup from, like 13 to 16, and I was like completely a girl from 14 to 16.

I came from a private school, and public high school was the first time I ever went to a public school. So I went into it very preppy; I was wearing a lot of Abercrombie and Hollister. Then, my sophomore year, I started listening to rock bands. I had a boyfriend that took me to my first rock show, and I was just addicted to that.

I didn't figure out the makeup or cute hair or clothes until oh, maybe my junior year of high school.

When I was thirteen years old, and we had just moved to Germany, I definitely felt I was missing out on normal teenage life. I was watching my old school friends from Canada grow up without me while I was in Germany trying to learn the language and trying to pass each year without failing.

When I was 13, before I got in high school, I was writing mad raps. I didn't really know if it was good or not, so for a year, I just held them. When I got in high school, I started spittin' bars.

School was tough. My 'friend' group consisted of two girls I had known since Year 7. We initially got on well but as the years went on, they'd tell me I was too loud, too in-your-face, that I laughed too much.

My first secondary school was in East Finchley, and I was one of only five white people in the year. I was really skinny and flat-chested with frizzy hair. I don't consider myself posh, but my mum brought me up to speak properly, and they picked up on that, as all kids do.

When I hit 11 so did the careers of Dylan and the Stones. A year later it was the Who and the Kinks.